Science may have found an answer to that question made famous by Maureen Dowd: Are men necessary? If other creatures are anything to go by, men are essential to keeping our species healthy, and would still be necessary even if women started making their own sperm.

That's more or less what happened to the male clam shrimp, a puddle and pond dweller that thrives in all continents except Antarctica. One day millions of years ago a mutant female started producing both sperm and eggs; that mutation spread until all the females were replaced by hermaphrodites. You'd think that would spell doom for the males.

Hermaphrodites also dominate one of our fellow vertebrates, a swamp dweller called a killifish. And yet male killifish crop up here and there.

Are these males getting any sex or in any way contributing to the gene pool? Are they necessary?

An even more serious question is why all animals don't become hermaphrodites, with its obvious perk of increased sexual opportunity. If you want to colonize new ponds or tide pools, say, it's advantageous to be able to mate with anyone of your species, including, in a pinch, yourself.

It works well for some corals, barnacles, shellfish, worms and many plants. But there are drawbacks.

"In some ways it is a matter of 'jack of all trades is a master of none,' " says Stephen Weeks, an evolutionary ecologist from the University of Akron, Ohio. The hermaphroditic shrimp he studies, for example, can't mate with each other. Only the males come equipped with a clawlike clasper for positioning the hermaphrodite so its eggs meet his sperm at the right time.

Without the males, the shrimp are stuck mating with themselves, says Weeks, and that's a problem. "That's often associated with something called inbreeding depression which is, basically... have you seen Deliverance?"

(In the classic '70s film, it's implied that inbreeding led to defects suffered by a mute banjo-playing savant.)

You can't get more incestuous than sex with yourself. Unlike asexual reproduction, which also occurs in nature and creates genetically identical clones, sex with yourself can double up copies of deleterious genes.

Say you're a hermaphrodite and you carry a gene for banjo savant syndrome, or BSS. You need two copies of the mutant BSS gene to have the disease and your cells carry just one, plus a normal copy.

But you divide your genes in half to make sperm, so half your sperm get a bad copy of the BSS genes. The same thing happens in your eggs. That means one of every four of your offspring will get two bad BSS genes and come out banjo savants. And if they're fertile, all their offspring will be banjo savants.

Preventing this kind of thing is the job of the male clam shrimp, and apparently has been for some time. All of the more than 30 known species of this creature mix hermaphrodites and males, suggesting they inherited this sexual strategy from a common ancestor before they diverged. And the fossil record indicates that was more than 24 million years ago.

Genetic diversity also keeps the male killifish in business despite the challenge of having to mate with hermaphrodites - and mean ones at that. When you put killifish together in a tank, the hermaphrodites tend to eat the males, says biologist John Elder of Valdosta State University in Georgia.

But in the wild, some obviously mate and escape, at least in Belize, where DNA tests show that males inject much-needed genetic diversity into the pool. For years, the scientists weren't finding males among Florida's killifish, but genetic tests conducted in the last few months reveal the Floridian fish are too genetically diverse to be having sex just with themselves.

The hermaphrodite fish might be mating with one another, Elder said, but as a general rule when they meet they "go after each other like piranhas." It might be that males not yet spotted are mixing up the genes.

In which case those male killifish, like male humans, are indeed necessary.

The real question is, are women like Moron Dowd necessary? She is breathing up the air that could be used by real women.

I am so sick of how men have been portrayed by society. On TV they are either gay, metro or a bumbling idiot Homer Simpsons. In advertising they seem to have to look to women for assistance in the smallest of household tasks. If it involves something other than their choice of beer or sports team then men are driveling idiots. Then women write songs asking where all the real men went....

I have no need for a woman who wants to be my equal. You are not my equal and you never will be. I will always be stronger than you. I will always be able to physically out play you and out kill you. Yes there will be freakish anomalies but that is the exception and not the rule. I have no tolerance for a woman who wants to take over my societal role. You are not a man. You are not and will not be one of the boys. You have nothing below the belt that has to be adjusted from time to time. You do not belong in my locker room, you do not belong on the drivers side of my car, you do not belong in my yard cutting my grass or under my car changing the oil. I don't care if I sound chauvinistic. If you don't like it I probably wont like you. If you insist that you can go in to a mens locker room an keep your eyes above a naked athletic man's waist and this be true....I have no need for you. If you cannot stomach turn about on that, a man going in to a women's locker room....preferably the Swedish womens ski team, then STFU when asking for equality when it is superiority you truly desire. You want to drive then go by yourself......I want a woman who wants to be taken somewhere. If you want to surprise me, great, drive....but lets not make it a habit. If you want to cut grass, start a lawn service. I work on my yard because I don't want to see you working so hard, you can bring me tea and look at me sweating in the hot sun....later we do a little role playing like I am Chico the lawn boy and you are the lonely housewife who brings him in and has her way with him....you get the picture?

Give me a woman who will be my partner, my helper....a woman who loves being a woman and loves a man who acts like a man. Give me a woman who enjoys being put on a pedestal, who enjoys flowers, who gives herself fully and passionately. Give me a woman who finds pleasure in being taken care of in every way possible.

The thing I find funniest is that women spend so much time and effort making their man in to Alan Alda or Woody Allen and then lament the fact that they are not Mel Gibson or Tom Cruise.

My firm belief is that a man's biggest mistake is listening to a woman who is too uncomfortable socially to admit who she is or too confused about her own wants and needs know what what she really wants. She wants what society tells her she should want and when she gets it, she ends up unhappy and unfulfilled.

Just give me a woman who is confident and unashamed about who and what she is. The rest of them can be bitter and jealous towards the women who embrace their femininity. You don't want to door held for you? Fine...just make sure it is shut all the way as you exit....I have nothing for you...

Men are still needed....real men who will take care of their woman and kids. Real men who open doors, pay for dinner, clean toilets, do laundry and not make the whites pink, change oil, cook on an open flame and a stove top equally well, who take care of themselves physically, and who are true to their commitments. When you break a man down and lower him to a bumbling dolt who is fat, lazy and rude then perhaps women will be correct in saying that those men are not needed....of course those "men" are not men at all.

When I hear the word matriarchy I think of Sir Francis Bacon and his many writings around that theme; a Google search brought me to this discourse which could easily lead to mental illness: read at your own risk.

22
posted on 10/02/2006 8:48:48 AM PDT
by Old Professer
(The critic writes with rapier pen, dips it twice, and writes again.)

How well would an article entitled "Are women really necessary" go over?

Actually it's quite unlikely since males are typically the more fragile sex, and most species that have dispensed with males reproduce through parthenogenesis or other asexual means for which the female is required--no species has eliminated females. No one's asking that question because it's really an extremely unlikely scenario.

23
posted on 10/02/2006 8:57:49 AM PDT
by ahayes
(My strength is as the strength of ten because my heart is pure.)

What the article actually shows is how male-female reproduction is necessary to resist genetic decline and the inbreeding-depression that comes from mating with yourself.

This is expected in a created biology that was designed to resist decline. Sexual reproduction, the triplet-codon amino-acid coding scheme, DNA error-correction schemes and diploid chromosome structure are all mechanisms clearly designed to resist genetic decline. All of these schemes *slow* the spread of 'beneficial' mutations and support the conservation of existing genetic information. The fact that they exist is *not* evidence that they 'evolved' (contrary to evo belief).

Were evolution true, we should see only asexual reproduction and parthenogenesis since those are the most efficient ways of 'evolving' *if* beneficial mutations (definition-dependent term) make significant contributions to 'molecules-to-man evolution'. The organism that has the 'beneficial' mutation and reproduces sexually (or asexually) by itself (parthenogenesis) and produces more offspring with the 'beneficial' mutation if it had to mate with a 'less-fit' mate. The fact that we do not see exclusive parthenogenesis and asexual reproduction means that evolution is not true.

It is not a failed prediction of evolution, you're predicting things exactly back to front!

Methods that would increase genetic shuffling between different organisms are bound to evolve because the methods of asexual reproduction that do not allow such shuffling are subject to Muller's ratchet. So life operates exactly as the theory of evolution would predict. The theory of evolution predicts that species that reproduce without gene shuffling between organisms either have an additional route of reproduction that involves such shuffling or are evolutionarily very young (such as some species of parthenogenetic lizards).

31
posted on 10/02/2006 11:31:07 AM PDT
by ahayes
(My strength is as the strength of ten because my heart is pure.)

Muller's Ratchet was not predicted by evolution, it was discovered long after the 'theory' was birthed and merely *incorporated* because of the assumption that 'what exists must have evolved'.

Genetic shuffling is necessary to prevent the deterioration and decline of the genome. But it wasn't predicted by evolution. A created biology that is subject to decline however, does require conservative mechanisms to prevent genetic deterioration and that's exactly what we see.

Very different thing altogether and proof that it is the evos that have things back-to-front.

The fact that we do not see exclusive parthenogenesis and asexual reproduction is a failed predictions of evolution since those two reproductive methods would 'evolve' the fastest were evolution true.

Sorry, you are wrong. The theory of evolution would predict the existence of sexual reproduction because asexual reproduction is much more slow at innovation, and any method of gene shuffling would take off in conditions requiring change and outrun the asexually reproducing organisms. Likewise asexually reproducing populations will inevitably build up harmful mutations, so evolution predicts that asexually reproducing populations will either have a way to exchange DNA or will be new populations.

You're breaking ranks and reasoning backwards. You say that sexual reproduction is an invention to prevent deterioration of a designed creature's genome. Yet sexual reproduction preceeded the Fall, so that could not possibly have been the initial reason for it. In fact, assuming an initial perfect creation would seem to indicate that there should be a single initial organism in each species that embodied absolute perfection for that species, and that these organisms should reproduce asexually to produce true clones. Change in the genome should be strictly prohibited, because any change would be moving away from that ideal.

So your conclusion implies that Adam and Eve would produce offspring that were not exact copies and thus could be more or less perfect, which should be forbidden in a pre-Fall world.

Additionally, you are breaking ranks and opening Pandora's box. You claim that recombination in meiosis is a divine mechanism. However, recombination in meoisis is similar to the process of recombination in bacteria which allows bacteria to produce novel genes, which the creationist side typically vows does not occur. A similar mechanism is responsible for various chromosomal breaks and rearrangements (eep, does that mean God planned genetic diseases caused by broken chromosomes?) These chromosomal rearrangements occur without rhyme or reason. Creation "science" would not predict them to occur--in fact it would predict absolute stasis as many creationists have told me. The theory of evolution would predict such random changes. The theory of evolution is able to use chromosomal rearrangments to trace the line of descent of a variety of organisms--the best creation "science" can do is say "God put this gene on this chromosome in this species and on this other chromosome in this other species because he likes being completely arbitrary like that. He's testing our faith."

Next thing you know, you're going to be a theistic evolutionist. :-D

43
posted on 10/03/2006 6:21:30 AM PDT
by ahayes
(My strength is as the strength of ten because my heart is pure.)

Asexual reproduction is faster, not slower, because 'more fit' individuals could reproduce much, much faster.

The fact that asexually-reproducing populations inevitably build up harmful mutations is a fact not predicted by evolution but one perfectly consistent with a created biology that is in decline. You merely incorporate what actually exists into 'evolution' because you have decided 'a priori' that evolution is 'true'.

You appeal to gene shuffling is only beneficial once the genetic information already exists, but that is the foundation of creation and ID.

You are the one who is reasoning backwards. The fact that sexual reproduction preceded the fall has nothing to do with the 'initial reason' for it and neither does your claim that 'perfect' organisms are a requirement of creation nor your claim that change in the genome should be strictly prohibited. Those are merely your opinions.

I also do not claim that meosis is a 'divine mechanism'. There is no 'god' in meosis. Again, your argument of creating 'novel genes' through meosis depends on information that already exists, not creating new information (which is required for evolution).

Saying that chromosomal rearrangements occur 'without rhyme or reason' is an argument from ignorance, as I'm sure you know. We simply don't know why they occur. As has been shown in koala bears, extreme chromosomal rearrangements can occur without affecting the phenotype of the organism. This points toward the cell itself as the primary control over the genome, not the other way around. This creates a chicken-and-egg problem for evolution, but not for creation.

The theory of evolution predicted no such thing as random change. Random change is bad. It destroys much more information than it 'creates'. Take a book, shred it and randomly put it back together. Do you have usable information? No you do not. Same with random change in the genome. It destroys information. Change within the genome is *constrained*, not random. This fact places severe limits on what 'evolution' can do and makes it perfectly consistent with a created biology that is in decline.

What you refer to is shuffling and sorting of existing information, but again you must start from a position of having information available first. Once again, no 'creating' new information by 'evolution'. Merely shuffling and sorting of existing informatin which is consistent with creation.

Evolutionists only think they are tracing common descent. Genes on different chromosomes mean nothing at all. It is only in the evolutionist's mind starting from the 'a priori' position that common descent is true that any 'history' can be 'created'. It's total mental masturbation.

Asexual reproduction is faster, not slower, because 'more fit' individuals could reproduce much, much faster.

Sorry, you are wrong! Muller mentions the way sexually reproducing species can outcompete asexually reproducing ones in unstable environments way the heck back in his 1932 paper.

The fact that asexually-reproducing populations inevitably build up harmful mutations is a fact not predicted by evolution

Der, yes it is. Evolution is based upon variation. Not all variation is good. Failing to eliminate bad variation results in eventual extinction.

I'm afraid you need to remove your blinders.

Saying that chromosomal rearrangements occur 'without rhyme or reason' is an argument from ignorance, as I'm sure you know. We simply don't know why they occur. As has been shown in koala bears, extreme chromosomal rearrangements can occur without affecting the phenotype of the organism.

What is this, "I'm more ignorant than you, therefore you must not know what you're talking about"? There is no reason why chromosomal remodelling should require phenotype change, in fact if it does it is usually bad. Chromosome remodelling can be extremely useful in introducing reproduction barriers, though.

The theory of evolution predicted no such thing as random change.

I'm only refraining from beating my head against the wall because I know that it's bad for my poor brain. Random variation and the effects of natural selection upon it are the foundations of the theory of evolution.

Again, your argument of creating 'novel genes' through meosis

Quote? I would never say something so stupid.

Evolutionists only think they are tracing common descent. Genes on different chromosomes mean nothing at all. It is only in the evolutionist's mind starting from the 'a priori' position that common descent is true that any 'history' can be 'created'.

Wow, that is so puzzling. Using evolutionary theory we can predict what similarities are likely to be shared by certain groups of organisms. For instance, evolutionary theory says that monotremes split off from other mammals long ago, and after that the main group of mammals split into marsupials and eutherians. Say we find a chromosomal modification in eutherians but not in marsupials (as we have). Using the theory of evolution, we can predict that this modification will not be present in monotremes. Indeed, we find that it is absent.

Creation "science" can make no such predictions at all. All creation "science" has is a meaningless pile of information which cannot be synthesized into any sensible whole. The conclusion is that God just arbitrarily decided to do things this way in this group and this way in this other group, and ("to test our faith") set everything up so that rational phylogenies can be created so anyone with half a brain would think that common descent is true. What a joker.

46
posted on 10/04/2006 6:25:38 AM PDT
by ahayes
(My strength is as the strength of ten because my heart is pure.)

Tell your 'sexually reproducing species outcompete asexually reproducing ones' story to the thousands of people who die each year of MSRE. That whole bogus argument is based on the *assumption* that multiple 'beneficial' mutations exist and need to be incorporated into a population. This also assumes a 'not too high' level of mutations in the asexual populations, a 'not too large' sexually-reproducing population and that the 'beneficial' mutation escapes the effects of genetic drift. In summary, Muller's position is theoretical, not real world.

In the real world, sexual reproduction slows 'evolution' because any organism with a 'beneficial' mutation must mate with ones lacking that mutation thereby 'throwing away' 1/2 of their reproductive capacity. Also, most 'beneficial' mutations have an extremely low fitness increases that are limited to specific environments and genetic drift swamps most [(1-2s)%] of those. This is why we 'should' see ubiquitous obligate parthenogenesis, but because we don't evolution can't be responsible.

And what makes you think that introducing reproductive barriers is a 'good' thing? Access to genetic variety is beneficial in all organisms, not harmful. That's why you don't marry your sister.

And again, get up to speed. Mutation is not-random. If random mutation is a 'prediction' of evolution as you claim, then evolution is falsified.

How can you be so obtuse? This is not a theoretical thing, it has been demonstrated in live populations.

Abstract Ecological theory predicts that genetic variation produced by sexual reproduction results in niche diversification and provides a competitive advantage both to facilitate invasion into genetically uniform asexual populations and to withstand invasion by asexual competitors. We tested the hypothesis that a large group of diverse clones of Daphnia obtusa has greater competitive advantage when invading into genetically uniform populations of this species than a smaller group with inherently less genetic diversity. We compared competitive outcomes to those of genetically uniform groups of small and large size invading into genetically diverse populations. Genetically diverse invaders of initially large group size increased their representation by more than those of initially small size; in contrast, genetically uniform invaders of initially large group size diminished on average by more than those of initially small size. These results demonstrate an advantage to the genetic variation produced by sexual reproduction, both in invasion and resisting invasion, which we attribute to competitive release experienced by individuals in genetically diverse populations.

And you've once again got things back to front. Muller's ratchet is based upon the elimination of negative mutations.

And what makes you think that introducing reproductive barriers is a 'good' thing?

For speciation purposes. Sometimes conversations with you just leave me at a loss for words, and not because your points are so cogent. . .

And again, get up to speed. Mutation is not-random.

Oh, so you can pick any two people with normal karyotypes and tell them "Your first child will have cri du chat syndrome" before that child is even a gleam in their eye? Some classes of mutations occur more in certain sequences than others (hard to introduce a thymine-thymine dimer when there are no thymines around), but the occurance of any mutation is a random event.

48
posted on 10/05/2006 5:09:31 AM PDT
by ahayes
(My strength is as the strength of ten because my heart is pure.)

I am not obtuse, you are merely credulous. You apparently accept what these evolutionist scientists tell you without actually thinking it through.

Your reference merely shows that existing genetic variety is important for reproductive success. Where are your 'beneficial' mutations being more successful in a sexually-reproducing population over an asexually-reproducing one? That was the previous claim that I responded to and what you presented does not address that issue at all.

What you presented is evidence that existing genetic variety is key for competitive succes (even survival, I would say). That is evidence *against* the observed effect of erecting reproductive barriers, not evidence in favor of sexual reproduction over asexual.

Didn't you notice that these guys didn't *generate* the genetic variety with sexual reproduction *during* their experiment, they *introduced* it (or not as they varied their test). That's the key.

In their experiment, the degree of genetic variety was controlled in both the invading and the defending colonies. At the end, they merely *assert* that variety is 'generated' by sexual reproduction. They didn't actually *show* it.

All they really proved is that genetic variety is the key to competitive success. In both sides of this experiment (invading or defending), the genetically diverse population had the greatest success. That's all that can be said.

This is *exactly* *why* 'raising reproductive barriers' is *not* a 'good' thing for evolution. They did *not* show any genetic variety being 'generated'. They controlled the amount of variety in all populations throughout the experiment and then *interpreted* it for you. You, credulous as you are, merely *believe* the interpretation. *Without* thought, apparently.

And your response to my question about why erecting reproductive barriers is supposedly a 'good' thing was, 'for speciation purposes'. That is so lame I can tell you gave it absolutely no thought. Or couldn't come up with a better answer.

Finally, Muller's Ratchet is the *accumulation* of negative mutations in a population. It is the *failure* to eliminate negative mutations, not the elimination of them. That's what the 'ratchet' is. An allele has become homozygous for a deleterious mutation and the 'ratchet' has clicked one more notch.

Now, go study mutation and you will find that it is *constrained*, not random. You admit as much in your response and then try to pretend what is constrained is really 'random'. Do you even understand what 'random' really is? What you refer to as 'random' is actually *constrained* and you are misrepresenting the truth.

All they really proved is that genetic variety is the key to competitive success. In both sides of this experiment (invading or defending), the genetically diverse population had the greatest success. That's all that can be said.

Has it somehow escaped your realization that asexually reproducing populations on these time scales are necessarily either essentially (pseudoclonal) or absolutely (clonal) variationless??? (<-- Yes, the increasing number of question marks is a sign that you are driving me towards insanity by the bizarreness of your argument. Keep up the good work.) The whole point of the article is a demonstration that sexually reproducing populations inherently have more variation and thus will outcompete asexual populations in situations with limited resources.

Finally, Muller's Ratchet is the *accumulation* of negative mutations in a population. It is the *failure* to eliminate negative mutations, not the elimination of them. That's what the 'ratchet' is. An allele has become homozygous for a deleterious mutation and the 'ratchet' has clicked one more notch.

I'm so proud of you! You read something! Yes, the point is that sexual reproduction avoids Muller's ratchet by expurgating negative mutations.

And your response to my question about why erecting reproductive barriers is supposedly a 'good' thing was, 'for speciation purposes'. That is so lame I can tell you gave it absolutely no thought. Or couldn't come up with a better answer.

LOL!

50
posted on 10/06/2006 5:42:09 AM PDT
by ahayes
(My strength is as the strength of ten because my heart is pure.)

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